


Eyes on Me

by zerograviga



Category: Check Please! (Webcomic)
Genre: Alternate Universe, M/M
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2016-07-03
Updated: 2016-07-03
Packaged: 2018-07-19 20:51:18
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 3,240
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/7376914
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/zerograviga/pseuds/zerograviga
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>After a fallout with his ex-boyfriend and other half of the singing duo J+K, Kent Parson about going solo, Jack Zimmermann overdoses and loses his recording contract. After a few months of rehab Jack, now ex-teen sensation, returns to singing by getting a job at a small bar in Samwell, Massachusetts.</p><p>Lol this is my first fanfiction thingie sorry if its bad I just couldn’t stop thinking about this AU I thought of and wanted to give it a try.</p><p>Lyrics & Title is taken from Eyes on Me by Faye Wong</p>
            </blockquote>





	Eyes on Me

_“Oh really? Gonna Justin Timberlake me huh?”, Kent said with a chuckle._

_“Nah, I thought it’d be like pulling a Michael Jackson.” Jack joked back, but after a beat he added, “I’m serious Kenny.”_

_Jack felt Kent’s body go tense in his arms. He didn’t know why he decided to bring up while they were cuddling in their trailer, watching old music videos of the Backstreet Boys, but he did. Kent lifted up instantly after he said it and his face was at conflict with his eyes. It contorted into such an angry look that his cowlicks became reminiscent of horns but his eyes, his eyes were on the brim of tears._

***

“Hey, Jack! You gotta wake up, brah! You’re on in 5!” a voice said hastily.

“Kenny…I’m sorry…”Jack mumbled.

“Kenny? Dude!?”, the voice replied clearly offended, “If you don’t get up right now I’ll go up there and sing myself!”

Jack again mumbled something in his sleep, something about cowlicks. The voice fed up with Jack’s loafing took a deep breath and screamed his name into his ear.

“Huh?! Quelle?!” Jack sprang up from the bar with a swiftness knocking over a glass in the process.

He scanned his surroundings noting that everyone at the bar was staring at him. He looked down at himself then back up to the bartender. He was a lean man with a mustachioed face and a trendy haircut, Jack could not only see the urgency in his eyes but worry as well.

“Good morning, sunshine.”, The bartender said with a smirk, “You got about twenty seconds before its open mic night here.”

Jack tilted his head to the side a confused look on his face. The bartender motioned to a small stage in a corner, it was a small wooden stage adorned with small lights and various colors and small plants around the edges. At the front of the stage was a lone micstand and behind it was sitting a small four man band all staring right back at Jack.

Jack was about to say something when it finally clicked, he was at work. He shot up from his barstool with a panicked look on his face.

“Oh, crap!”, he gasped, “Sorry Shits! I was having a crazy dream!”

Shits, or better known as Shitty, sighed, “Look its cool man, but next time don’t pass out on the bar! It’s gross.”

Jack felt a small smile creep up on his face as he rushed to the stage nearly stampeding over multiple people on his way to the stage. Once he reached the little staircase leading to it he leapt to the top, garnering a small applause from the crowd, and waved a hello his coworkers behind him. They all sighed with a relief at once.

“Y’know next time don’t take a nap this close to showtime,” chirped Snowy the guitarist and resident trumpeter.

“Yeah! How do you expect us to singing with no singer!”, announced Tater their keyboardist.

“Now men, we all know Jacky here needs his beauty sleep”, chimed in Marty the bassist and the dad of their little group, “how else are we gonna get tips?”

“Maybe Snowy can show the ladies in the crowd how to wing their eyeliner?” Thirdy chirped from his drum set, earning a glare from Snowy, and a giggle from Poots their killer sax player.

Jack gave out a soft chuckle, “Alright, alright let’s give these people they’re money’s worth, eh?”

Jack turned to face the crowd who all were looking back expectantly. Feeling the nervousness creeping in he gave a deep breath before turning his head to look back at the guys one more time.

“Hit it.”, Jack said with a snap of his fingers.

It was a simple setlist tonight starting with a cover of Fly Me To The Moon by Frank Sinatra. Jack begins singing and just like magic his nervousness disappears. He feels so at home, so complete, when singing and his voice is rich with emotion. Shitty always jokes that Jack’s basically a talking rock, serious and broody, when he’s not singing but boy, when he does it’s like an angel came down from heaven. As their first song ends and their met with applause and whistles Jack scans over the crowd picking out all the regulars that are there that night.

First, he notices the redheaded young man covered in freckles, a regular ever since before Jack started working here according to Shitty. The man usually comes alone typically looking stressed and worn out from what Jack considered one hell of a day at college but tonight, he looked more nervous than anything. Jack frowned a bit worrying about the guy until he noticed another young man with green eyes and a tattoo on his right arm walking to the redhead’s table. Jack picked up on what was happening instantly and giggled to himself a bit, silently wishing this all goes well at least for the redhead’s sake.

Next he noticed two more regulars sitting at a table closer to the bar. The pair consisted of a large man with dark skin wearing his usual attire of scrubs and the other was a slightly larger blond man wearing the semiformal combo of a black slacks and a shirt and tie. They seemed to be in a deep discussion until one of them, the blond, started waving his hand beckoning over a newcomer. Jack never saw the newcomer before, who was shocking smaller than the other two but, for some reason he looked a tad bit familiar. The smaller man had blond hair and was wearing clothing similar to the larger blond, after he noticed the other guys he waved back and smiled slightly rushing over to them. They quickly got into a big group hug and the man in the scrubs motioned to prepare a toast prompting Jack to assume they were celebrating something.

Jack got a tap on his back from Snowy signaling it was time to continue the setlist. Jack greeted the crowd with a certain suaveness he taught himself after hearing from Shitty that he should try engaging the crowd more to get better tips. He introduced the next song  and started singing.

***

“Oh my, he really is so much better live.” Eric said in wonderment.

“See told ya Bits,” chimed in Adam, a large blonde man and Eric’s business partner/accountant, “the guy’s an angel.”

“Yeah can you believe that THE Jack Zimmerman, teen heart throb and one half the the J+K duo is singing here!,” added Justin, who was still in his scrubs from his residency at the local hospital

Eric hummed in agreement.  The three of them were old college friends who stuck together after graduation, tonight they were celebrating for Eric’s bakery, Bitty’s, making it into an issue of Pastry & Baking, a high profile baking magazine. The bakery was situated a few blocks from the bar and surprisingly Eric never bothered coming in despite being close to it for little over a year. Adam and Justin met at the bar constantly since it was closer than home and easy for Justin to get to from the hospital. They coerced Eric into joining them there that night after dropping that Jack Zimmermann sung there full time. Eric freaked out when he heard it since he was a full on J+K fanboy when they were popular and scolded Adam and Justin for not telling him about Jack’s bar singing until now.

Eric watched as Jack sung feeling his heart soar just from hearing the passion in his voice. Song after song Eric watched, completely entranced by Jack’s siren call. It was the best time of his life until, Jack looked right at him in the middle of a love song. Eric froze in place and with his face going completely red with blush. He then quickly turned away trying to hide his face from Jack and started muttering “Oh my god” repeatedly. Adam chuckled and placed his hand on his back reassuring him that he needs to relax a bit.

Luckily, that was the last song of the night causing Eric to question how long they’d been there. Justin and Adam handed him some cash and chirped him to go tip the singer, unless he’s too chicken. Eric, determined to not be labeled chicken, grabbed the cash and hurried to the stage where Jack was untying his tie.

“Good lord give me the strength,” Eric said with a sigh under his breath.

Jack, taking notice of him, turned to him with his tie undone and a few buttons of his shirt open, revealing bits of chest hair, and gave him a slight smile, “Enjoy the show?”

Eric nearly loses his composure but, wills himself to stand tall, “He’s just a another guy”, he thinks to himself, “Y-yeah! Umm.. you did really well my friend says you look like an angel!” he says the nervousness apparent in his voice.

Jack raises and eyebrow and Eric face goes mortified once he realize what he said, “I-I-I mean sing! You sing like an angel!,” he adds quickly, “Umm anyway… here’s a tip!” Eric brings up his hand and reveals a couple of ten dollar bills, which managed to crumple in his embarrassment.

“Oh, um, thanks.” Jack says has he grabs the money from Eric’s hand, “but next time tip jar’s over there.”, he added with a smile while pointing to a jar at the other end of the stage.

Eric goes red from embarrassment and lets out a light laugh. Internally he was kicking himself for making a fool of himself not once but twice in front of Jack Zimmermann. He begins walking back to his friends who seem giddy about him and declare knowing the details on what went down. Eric explained how he ran up and gave Jack the money to his face which caused a roar of laughter from the bigger men, and then detailed how he had to be told were the tip jar was for next time.

“Next time?” Adam inquired wiping a tear from laughing from his eye.

“Yeah…”, Eric said looking lovingly at Jack who was helping the other band members with their gear, “next time.”

***

Surprisingly there were quite a few next times. So many that Adam, Justin, and Eric got on good terms with the bartender Shitty. He told them the story of how Jack came to work there after meeting his boss/girlfriend? Larissa. Apparently there was an open mic night there a little bit after Jack got out of rehab and Larissa, who was the bartender at the time, coerced him into going up there after realizing who he was. Jack refused at first but eventually she got him to go up there and he looked so happy to be singing she told the then boss, John Johnson, to hire him full time.

Jack took notice of how chummy they were getting one night to Shitty. To which Shitty replied that they’re not a bad bunch of guys they seem really chill and the small one, Eric, owns a bakery so he’s been getting free pastries on the slick. Bakery resonates in Jack’s head. That’s where he’s seen Eric before! He walks past the bakery every evening when getting off his bus stop from his apartment when going to work! Jack loves walking past the bakery since it always smells like cinnamon and a hint a maple, which reminds him of home. Shitty suggests he go in there one day and check the place out, especially since they have authentic Canadian maple syrup, courtesy of their friend Justin.

So he did.

He goes in the morning and is welcomed by the smell of fresh baking cookies when he walks in. The place has rows of various pastries in alignment with small woodcut signs on top of them depicting a different pastries. The entire place reminds Jack of something out of a magazine or TV set and remarks the entire place feels like a home more than a place of business. Above the cashier’s counter there’s “Georgia on my mind” in quotes in brown. There’s a young cashier there with brown hair and for some reason looks completely confused by whatever he’s looking at in a magazine.

“Tony’s always like that, don’t mind him.”, said another young clerk that appeared from behind a row of donuts, this one also had brown hair and a trendy haircut causing Jack to wonder if he missed the memo about hairstyles, “The guy could get confused by a color by the numbers book.”, he added with a small chuckle.

“Anyway I’m Javier, but the boss calls me Whiskey,” he says pointing to his name tag on his apron that has Whiskey printed on it with a small whisk sticker next to it, “So are you picking up and order or a walk-in?”

“Uh. Walk-in.” Jack answers.

“Okay, well the pies should be done cooling any minute now and they’re best fresh,” Whiskey mentions, “I have some more donuts to put out but Tony should be able to help you.” he said pointing towards the impossibly confused cashier.

“Um. Okay. Thanks.” Jack says as Whiskey walks off to the back.

Jack stands there awkwardly for a bit until he hears the door to the kitchen opening to reveal a familiar face.

“Tony , go help Whiskey with the donuts,” Eric said walking out of the kitchen with a pie in each hand, “Chris’ll be here any minute to take his shift for cashier so I’ll cover it.”

“Yes, sir, Mr. Eric!,” Tony said hopping off the stool he was sitting on rushing through the kitchen doors.“

"Lord I’ve told that boy a hundred times stop calling me mister, I’m not that much older than he is.”, Eric grumbled to himself placing the pies in their display cases on the counter.

He takes notice of the man standing there in the corner of his eye, “I’ll be right with you, sir.”, he chimes.

“Sir? Why, I’m not that much older than you are.” Jack chirps in his mockingly southern accent.

Eric closes the case on the pies and turns to directly face the customer and freezes in place. He was here. Jack Zimmermann, teenage heart throb and one half of J+K, was here, in his bakery, and, and,.. teasing him?!

“Well where I’m from addressing a customer as sir is just common courtesy,” Eric said matter of factly while crossing his arms.

Jack chuckled a bit from Eric’s retort, “Sorry, sorry. Nice place you got here, Eric.”

Bitty gave Jack a confused look. How’d he learn his name he never once talked to the guy after that one encounter the first night he saw him, but it’s been months and the only person there he’s talked to was, “Shitty…” Eric said with a sneer.

Jack smiled, “Yeah, he told me you owned this bakery and that you carried authentic Canadian maple syrup so,” he said drawing out the o on so, “I had to check it out.”

“Oh! Yeah we do!” Eric said with a bright smile, “The co-owner’s boyfriend is from Canada so he hooks us up.” he said walking over to the shelf with the syrup on it.

 _“Co-owner?”_ Jack thought, “ _Oh he must mean that big guy, Adam.”_

Jack follows Eric back to the cash register where Eric rings him up and hands him the maple syrup in a small bag.

“So I’ll see you tonight, eh?” Jack says.

Eric blushes a bit but manages to stammer out,“Y-yeah, sure!”

Jack walks out the bakery with a smile on his face he can’t wait to get home and try out the syrup.

***

A few months pass and Jack frequents Eric’s bakery nearly as often as Eric shows up to his shows, Eric has even started coming alone a few times. They talk a bit more over time and Jack finds himself singing to Eric most of time and for some reason Jack starts singing even better than before. Shitty brings it up and mentions maybe he likes the guy. But did he? Jack hadn’t really tried dating after Kent, except for a little fling with a girl named Camilla that lasted a few months right until he walked into that bakery actually. That’s when it hits him, Shitty’s right he was in love with Eric. Jack made a decision to reveal his feelings the only way he knew how: through song.

Jack got with his band members and pulled out the old setlist from when Eric first entered the bar. He told that he wanted to play the same songs but with one extra one added. They all agreed since they could feel the determination coming from him and when Snowy mentioned something about “that little blond you’ve been eyeing” Jack didn’t deny it.

Showtime roles around and Jack wears his favorite tux and eyes Eric, along with Justin and Adam, as the walk it smiling at them from the stage. This earns him a little wave from Eric and they take their sits at a table closest to the stage. They reach the end of their setlist and Jack thanks everyone for joining them but mentions they have one last song tonight.

“This song goes out to someone.,” Jack starts, his heart beating rapidly,“So let’s hope it won’t fall on deaf ears, eh?”

He takes a deep breath and turns and nods to his band, “Hit it.” [((Song link here))](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=4qcW0oiLKHg)

The song starts melodic and smoothing and then Jack’s cue to start singing comes. He begins looking out over the entire crowd, but once he reaches the second verse, he looks right into Eric’s eyes.

 _I saw you smiling at me_  
Was it real or just my fantasy?  
You’d always be there in the corner  
Of this tiny little bar

 _My last night here for you_  
Same old songs, just once more  
My last night here with you?  
Maybe yes, maybe no

 _I kind of liked it your way_  
How you shyly placed your eyes on me  
Did you ever know  
That I have mine on you?

Jack smiles while singing thanks to Eric going completely red and once they realize what’s happening Adam and Justin start pushing Eric to go up on stage. Eric looks like he’s in a mix of shock and confusion and Jack takes this opportunity to walk off the stage and stand right before him.

 _So let me come to you_  
Close as I wanna be  
Close enough for me  
To feel your heart beating fast

 _And stay there as I whisper_  
How I loved your peaceful eyes on me?  
Did you ever know  
That I have mine on you?

By this point the crowd is in complete awe, some even recording the entire thing. Eric is completely struck silent his body completely red. Jack steps back onto the stage smiling larger than he has in a long time and continues the song to finish.

Once he finishes Jack rushes down to Eric, who has seemed to finally recover from what happened, and grabs his hand.

“So? What’d you think?”, Jack says smirking.

“I-I think,” Eric stammers, “ I-I think you’re an angel.”

Jack moves in closer to him and places a kiss on his lips, “Well, I think you’re an angel, too.”

The crowd surges in an uproar and applause.

 


End file.
